Friday, July 27, 2007

Howdy folks!!

Well when we arrived into Australia nearly 5 months ago, We didn't think Snowboarding would be one of the things we would be doing.... but we were up at 3.30am (!!!!) to get on the road by 4.20am so we could get a full day up at Mt. Buller which is 3 1/2 hrs north of Melbourne.


All this came about from Charlies work, She has a season pass and free lessons and obviously free rental equipment, but her boss also sorted me out with free equipment and a super cheap day pass and lesson ($73) for the day!!! Bargain!


This is Dane, He works with Charlie and drove us up there!! I don't know how he was so cheerful at that time in the morning, and yes mum, he is a very safe driver and his car was safe.


One major disadvantage of being tall and generally large is its almost impossible to get comfortable in the back of cars, even when your very tired and want to sleep, not her though she was out cold for most of the journey, Aaaaaaawwwwwww look at her!


This was my chariot for the day, Its brown, long and has sharp edges....... Yup, you guessed it, I know nothing about snowboards.


Dane was tweaking my bindings for my stance.


SNOW!!! Obviously you need all the right clothes for snowboarding and we were given free rental gear so we cant complain, (Although I could have done with a slightly bigger jacket!)


Charlie has been up here the week before and had already done her first lesson so was a pro compared to me!!


The mountain was truly stunning, we were blessed as the weather was perfect, only a few clouds in a brilliant blue sky. Also we had timed it perfect as the school holidays were over so it was really really quite, only the week before when Charlie was up here it was horrible weather and was packed full of kids!


This is near the summit of Mt. Buller. Towards the end of the day we both went up and found a different run from the learner run and it was totally different, much better snow and less people out of control.


How cool is that! Totally empty.


"Well I'm not gonna get down this mountain with out your help, so hop to it!"


My lesson started at 11am for 2hrs, the lesson was great and really helped with a few little things that made the world of difference, it came pretty easy and my confidence grew, right up until the front edge of my board caught and I went FLYING........... I got my first proper spill over with and it wasn't so bad, so I just got back up and kept trying.


Getting to the top of mountain was really cool, its pretty physical stuff so before heading down together we would have a sit down a take it all in and get our energy levels up. Its an amazing feeling when you are getting it right and you're literally flying down the side of a mountain, its even better to look across and see your girlfriend rip by you and give you a wave!! The little legend!


I'm standing like that partly 'cus my shoulder hurts and also because my left foot is still attached to the board. Towards the end our energy levels were pretty low, but its the most fun I've had in a while.


This is the flat area above the learners area and below a few other runs, now I've never been to the Alps or anywhere else skiing/snowboarding but for Australia I was seriously impressed.


Looking up at the summit....... pretty cool.


The little town at the bottom was really nice, few small shops and a couple of places to get fed. There is also a smaller branch of Charlies store so we could leave our bags and stuff in while we were up the mountain. Handy.


It was coming towards the end of the day and we were both bloody wrecked, so it was time for:


Some amazing Hot Chocolate!!

It really was a brilliant day and we are both hooked, we are gonna try and get a few days together so we can spend the day or 2 up there and not have to worry about driving home after which is pretty tough going, Wish us luck!!

Sean & Charlie

Oh and best wishes to my daddy from both myself and Charlie (He had a bit of an accident while fishing on his birthday!)

Sunday, July 22, 2007

Hello,

Well its been pretty quite in the Burke/Ratcliff household, just working away and saving cash, we should have done something exciting by the end of the week, so expect a decent update by the weekend!

To keep you going till then:

Just in case you all thought our travels was all amazing beaches and whale sharks, here is me trying to eat on the over night train in Vietnam......


These noodles were surprisingly tasty and were included in the ticket price!!


Look at how tiny that spoon is!!! totally pointless when trying to eat dessert, so I just went back to basics!!


Which gave me a bad case of the hicups, much to Charlies delight!!

See ya!

S+C

Monday, July 02, 2007

How ya now!

Well I hope you're all doing well wherever you may be!

1st things first, Happy Birthday DAD!!! I know it was yesterday but I had not gone through my photos and picked the good ones yet!! I hope you had a great day and mum and Jackie spoiled you rotten, you deserved it!


What's more boring than doing your laundry? Watching your girlfriend do hers....... (Mine's still good from that clean a few weeks back)


We don't have any washing machines in our apartment and buying them doesn't make much sense when the local laundry is so cheap.


These dryers are so big, Charlie had to almost climb into it to get her socks back,


Yup, trying to make boring everyday things look good again......


This is Acland St, it's the slightly cooler end of St. Kilda. There are loads of cafes, bars and independent shops. It also has the highest concentration of bakeries I've ever seen on one street, Charlie says you put on weight just walking past them......


How cool is that!!


There were loads of other things to take pictures of on Acland St, but I had to carry home a clothes-rack, so it stops there.....


That evil looking stadium spewing out steam is called the Melbourne cricket ground, or the MCG, or "The G", Aussies like to abbreviate everything, it can take a bit of getting used to. It doesn't really bother me too much, but it can spark Charlie off something crazy!!



Well all that steam is coming from 85,000 All Blacks (New Zealand) and Wallabies (Australia) fans!!!



Yup, Charlie the little legend bought me a Tickets ($$$) to my first ever International Rugby match.


This is Obviously the Haka, which is an amazing way to start a match, especially as myself and Charlie were supporting the All Blacks.


The game was part of the Tri-nations, but the Cup is called the Bledisloe Cup.


I thought the Telstra dome was massive, but the capacity of the MCG is just under 100,000 people!!!


We had great seats, thanks to Charlie splashing out on them!!



This is the All Blacks missing a pretty crucial kick......



Now I'm not gonna pretend that I'm a know-it-all on the subject of rugby, but the All-blacks are often considered to be on a different level to most other rugby teams, but as we were about to find out, if it bleeds, it can be killed.



The first half was dominated by the all blacks, but it was not a very fluid half, lots of unforced errors, knock-ons and pretty much every scrum ended in a free/penalty. It was not what I was expecting from 2 world class teams.


Although I cant fault the Aussies for an atmosphere, the place was electric!!




I don't know if it was the fact that they had not fully recovered from South Africa last week, but the all blacks looked pretty slow and tired.


Line outs always impress me, its crazy just how high they get!!


Oh, what happened to your fancy lens? Drop it did ya? Ooohhhh, I don't see any brown tape holding my lens together.....





Half time!!



*Please, please, please*



No turning back.... He missed it and to me it was the turning point of the game (along with an "unfortunate" sin-binning!)


Lost it to the Wallabies.....



you will notice the hats, it was pretty cold that night, nearly got down the 13', Chilly!!!

Lost that one too...... and it lead to a try



Waiting for the kick, id say most NZ fans were feeling pretty sick about now......


Straight between the posts.



And that was that, the crowd went bloody insane (Could you blame them!!) but we were a bit disappointed in New Zealand, well actually a bit disappointed in both teams, I cant help feeling that Ireland would have walked over both teams that night, hell with the amount of mistakes that were made, Connacht would have had a fair chance.......

The Rugby world cup is in September in France, and after seeing the "Mystical" All Blacks, it just makes things a little bit more interesting come September, to paraphrase myself "If it bleeds, We can kill it"

Lets hope we do!!

Sean & Charlie